Summer 2011 Outlook

[normn3116]

Hey everyone,

I am a little confused here.  Depending on which camp I talk to, there are people who are optimistic about the summer 2L job outlook for 2011, and others who think it will be as bad (if not worse) than this year.  Does anybody have any inclination one way or another?

Making this question more specific to me, I am currently above median at Illinois Urbana-Champaign, have locked up an externship for this summer (get to sit in on the Drew Peterson trial, pretty pumped), and am the first person in my family or circle of friends' respective histories to go through law school.  I would just like to know what I can reasonably expect for this upcoming OCI and summer 2011 cycle.  Any help would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks!

[Talk Is Cheap]

It's awful this year. I was in your place a year ago (just above median--40%--), Minnesota Law, externed with a judge, got few OCI interviews and struck out.

I know kids from law review on down in my class who have nothing lined up for this summer. Word on the street is about 50% of this class has nothing for the summer...and of course, your chances in 3L are much worse.

How much will things turn around by your year? Maybe some, but probably not enough. It's an employer's market right now.

[normn3116]

If you don't mind my asking, what (if any) did you end up with?  Considering I mowed through applications to land a menial summer job with Home Depot before starting law school (I am doing this straight from UG), I have no problem doing a ton of legwork to secure myself employment.  I figure directly after OCI, I will be pounding the pavement.

[mnewboldc]

Summer 2011 will be a bloodbath, equally as bad (if not worse) than it was this year.

But you will have one advantage that my class did not have: you know how bad it's going to be and can take defensive measures earlier than we did.

[sheltron5000]

Everything I've heard says it should be at least a little bit better. Remember, they're hiring for 2012 this fall, and we're already starting to see associates lateral away from firms. It's not going to be a party like it's 2006 by any means, but it just wouldn't make sense for it to be as bad as last year.

[mnewboldc]

It would make all the sense in the world. No one knew how bad 2009 OCI was going to be beceause firms were trying to put up a prestige front and pretend that everything was business as usual (witness the Latham/Cadwalader plunge in the vault rankings once they implemented draconian measures). Now that the shine has come off, firms have little or no incentive to increase their numbers.

One of the effects of this recession was to shift the balance of power from firms to in-house counsel, and by most indicators, power will remain in their hands for the foreseeable future. The onus is now on firms to slash their fees, and one of the ways they have done that is to eliminate the number of high-priced bodies (read: young associates) that they throw at routine work. Instead, this work will be outsourced more and more to low-paid contract attorneys overseas.

With less work available, hiring of new associates will slow even further than it already has. The summer programs are enormous loss-leaders for firms anyway, and there's no reason to throw out a loss-leader when so many law students are already desparate for work. Given all of this, I would say that OCI for the classes of 2012 and beyond is looking very, very bad.

[mnewboldc]

If it's anything like last year, and if UIUIC places in Chicago the same way Fordham or Hastings places in SF/NY, then median at UIUIC isn't going to get anything from OCI unless you can really turn on the charm.

Start hitting the firms as soon as August rolls around. Stay away from the high end of NALP, because frankly it will already be flooded with resumes from the T14. Midlaw firms in flyover country think they can get T25 Law Review ITE. With 125 Columbia 2L's carpet-bombing the country (I've heard that the number of Columbia 2L's who got at least one offer from OCI dropped from 97% in 2008 to 67% in 2009), they're probably right.

If you know any lawyers, now would be a great time to start reaching out to them. By next September it will be far too late.

[Talk Is Cheap]

It's a bloodbath out there, the vast majority of 3Ls I know have no jobs and are looking for *&^% on craigslist. 3Ls estimate about 2/3rds of them have no job lined up and are still out there looking--along with all the 1Ls, 2Ls, laid off lawyers, and 2008/2009 grads who still haven't committed suicide and are looking for employment. Even our Career Services is panicking because after repeated calls and begging, only 100/284 (35%) of people have turned in their employment surveys (can't get people with no job to bother to turn it in). A lot more 3Ls who summered with the big firms in town are getting no-offered than ever before.

For the Class of 2011, things are at least as bad, if not worse. I'd guess that less than a third of us have a "real" temporary summer position lined up. Can think of several classmates who are top quartile and law review who can't find anything to do.
Words cannot express how ridiculously bad it is for the majority of our students. There will always be a bright forecast from those who actually do have jobs (even if they refuse to recognize they are temporarily employed as cheap summer labor), or from those handful of sunny folks who are ALWAYS confident that things will eventually go there way...but honestly, the school feels like a funeral parlor these days, and the overall attitude amongst our student colleagues is somewhere around "utterly miserable."

Good luck to everyone in their employment searches.